The View from the Top: Smith Alumnus Takes On CFO Role At Iconic Seattle Landmark

Seattle is the home to a number of iconic brands and an unmistakable skyline. Its silhouette contains one of the most photographed and recognized structures in the world.

“Anything Seattle-based, they always show the Space Needle,” Jeff Wallace, MBA ’98, said. Wallace recently became the chief financial officer of the Space Needle and Chihuly Garden and Glass. “It’s interesting because actually the number one rated tourism and attraction is the Chihuly Garden and Glass and the Space Needle is right behind that.” Wallace explained that these two entities form the business he helps to lead.

Though Wallace’s office isn’t high inside the actual Space Needle, his passion for learning and leading has helped him move up the ladder to managerial roles with some of the West Coast’s most notable brands. He also credits his East Coast experience, earning his MBA from the Robert H. Smith School of Business, for helping him gain the competitive edge to grow his career.

After starting at Boeing following his undergraduate studies, Wallace wanted to go back to school to “develop that bigger perspective”. He was drawn across the country to Smith because of its reputation, experiential learning opportunities and diverse student population.

Wallace said elements of his leadership style came from his experience as a teaching assistant at Smith. “I think you see a different side of leading when you teach,” he said. “When you say something and realize that 30 students interpreted it differently, you realize, OK, how do I get this message across in a way that everyone can walk away with at least the same general understanding of what I was trying to say?” adding that teaching was an “impactful experience” that would continue to resonate with him as he moved throughout his career. 

With each role, Wallace sought to learn something new that could be taken with him after he’d moved to a new organization. “I always viewed my career as being very finance-centric and just kind of walk up that ladder, director, VP, Senior VP. But I realized that you can both advance and kind of enrich your career by being opportunistic and doing different things,” he said. 

After graduating from Smith, Wallace moved back to the West Coast. His first of two tenures at Starbucks was during a time in which he said the organization was growing at a rapid pace. “We had jokes on late-night [TV] that they put a store inside of another store. Growth was a huge element of it.” Wallace said working as a finance manager at the coffee giant taught him to think about the people he was leading in a different way. “Starbucks has a term that everybody that works for them, whether you are in the retail store or you are in corporate, you are a partner,” he said. “It made me think a little bit differently because the culture is very much about developing, growing, ensuring the success of the partner, and that was very different from the kind of leadership I’d been exposed to at that point.”

After four years there, he moved to a new leadership opportunity to manage a larger team at the U.S. office of LexisNexis, a firm that offers research and information services. The role also allowed him to take on more diverse responsibilities within the finance space. 

“I got the opportunity to morph into a strategy leadership role. That went opportunistically to be the VP or a leader of a product. So not the finance piece of it, but the actual business. Which was invaluable.”

When he returned to Starbucks for a new opportunity, Wallace said he gained new insight on how to be an impactful leader for the people who work with you and work for you. He also stressed the importance of being able to work with people who are “at your level to move and advance work.” These takeaways influence his leadership style in his new role at the Space Needle and Chihuly Garden and Glass. 

“I wanted to have a bigger impact,” he said, which is difficult in a large organization. The Space Needle is privately owned by the descendants of one of the men who built it for the World’s Fair, Howard Wright.

“I wanted to be able to use my whole experience at my next job. I was getting to the point in my career where that was important to me,” Wallace said. “This is my first foray into the private [sector], but the Wright family is fantastic,” he added about his new employer. “They’ll provide a lot of support, so I think I’m in a really good spot.”

Wallace is proud of the work he’s done along the way and proud of his family, especially his two children. “I feel like they’re really good people. That makes me and my wife really proud.”

As he has done throughout his career, Wallace encourages everyone to take something from each role. “You don’t always know right in the moment what that thing is, but try to learn something from every stop you take.”